Pro Tip: Watching Porn Can’t Cause ED If You Don’t Have A Penis

Calico Rudasil is a feature columnist for Sssh.com, theaward-winning porn site for women & couples. With over 18 years’ experience under her belt, writing about and for the adult entertainment industry, Calico qualifies as something of a Web Porn Dinosaur; similar to a tyrannosaurus, only with far more attractive arms and a less pronounced overbite.

I have a confession to make, one of which I’m not proud: When it comes to problems which don’t and can’t affect me, I simply don’t care as much as I probably should.

I guess we’re all like this in a sense, because if we stopped to truly feel every tragedy and every obstacle faced by the rest of the world, we’d never have time to do anything else. There are too many wars, earthquakes, floods and famines on an annual basis for us to have time to do anything but light candles and cry, if were we really to be as sensitive to the plight of others as we are to our own challenges and obstacles.

Among other things, I think my detached nature helps explain why I’m not calling my Congressman or writing my local newspaper demanding that something be done about “porn-induced erectile dysfunction” or PIED.

Thankfully, Porn Never Made Hard In the First Place
You see, as a porn viewer who doesn’t have a penis, and who has observed no ill effects of porn-watching on the one penis with which she gets to interact at this point, PIED seems unlikely to ever touch my world (assuming it’s a real disorder to begin with).

First off, my own reaction to porn has never been one of hardness – unless mildly stiffened nipples count. And if you do count erect nipples, I’m happy to say repeated exposure to porn over a period of decades has done nothing to deter this reaction to stimulus on my body’s part.

Second, if watching porn is causing my husband to suffer PIED, someone forgot to tell him. He’s now “pushing 50 with a short, flabby stick” (to borrow a line from P.J. O’Rourke), yet he wakes up nearly every day with a raging erection. True, it’s a minor annoyance that he often seems to expect me to do something about said erection before I’ve even had a chance to wipe the sleep from eyes, but it’s still good to know the thing works and can be relied upon to answer the call.

Unfortunately, my husband is also something of a klutz, so I must be careful about when and where I issue the call for his penis to swing into action. Otherwise, he’ll just end up knocking all my knickknacks off the living room shelves, delaying and deterring considerably my intent to get laid. But that’s a whole different problem, and unless there’s such a thing as “Porn-Induced Klutzy Husband Syndrome,” as well, I think it’s safe to say the issue isn’t the videos we’ve been watching together.

It’s All About The Menfolk; Why Am I Not Shocked?
While the bulk of my response to the notion of PIED can be described as detached indifference, there’s also a small part of me which is irked by the fact the focus of potential excessive porn-watching pitfalls is all about the guys.

It reminds me of the fact that while I almost literally can’t turn on the TV without seeing an ad for Viagra or Cialis, I’ve never seen one such ad for a pill which does something for my sexual dysfunctions – if I had any diagnosed sexual dysfunctions, that is (although my husband certainly thinks not wanting to suck on his penis every time he wants me to do so qualifies).

To the extent we hear about women having problems with excessive porn viewing, the problem is usually a result of their partner’s “porn problem,” like not being able to get it up during sex with her, or feeling like he wants her to look and/or behave like the women in porn videos.

Has anybody even asked whether lesbian couples have experienced any problems from one (or both) members of the couple watching porn? I would guess they have not. Further, I would guess most people assume lesbians never watch porn at all. (This assumption is wrong, of course, but since when do facts matter here in 2016?)

You Guys Fight It Out; Meanwhile, I’ll Watch Porn If And When I Want To
At the core of the ongoing fight over porn’s various negative impacts alleged by anti-porn folks is the question of whether things like porn addiction and PIED are real disorders, or learned compulsive behaviors which don’t rise to the level of actual disorders.

For what it’s worth, not one of the neurologists, toxicologists, epidemiologists or psychologists to whom I’ve posed the question believes sex addiction or porn addiction is a true addiction. On the other hand, a lot of counselors and therapists say the problems caused by excessive porn consumption are real, regardless of whether they add up to something which can be termed an addiction or disorder.

As for me, since the world’s concern about excessive porn consumption appears to be entirely about men doing the consuming, I’m going to draw a warm bath, set up my tablet stand at tub-side and indulge until I feel like stopping – or until my husband comes home and breaks something which requires my immediate attention, whichever comes first.

Calico Rudasil is a Sssh.com (@ssshforwomen) columnist and Sssh will be on Peeperz for fun times again in the near future, meanwhile why not check us out: